There Is a Way
by Nutzkie
Summary: A continuation sequence for CaptainKodak1's oneshot, Where There Is a Will.  Reading The Captain's story first is HIGHLY recomended.  No more explaination will be given here.  You've been warned!
1. Chapter 1

**Introduction:**

Hello again, everyone! Long Time, no write-ey, it would seem…

Just a quick note about this piece… This is something I'm writing in response to a challenge by CaptainKodak1, asking for people to submit a continuation sequence for his one-shot story "Where There Is A Will." If you haven't read this one yet, stop reading this RIGHT NOW and go check out Cap's page. It's a good, quick read, and it's the only way anything I write from here on out is going to make any sense at all. (Unless you're taking some sort of drugs, of course.)

Please bear in mind that this is just a first chapter. I'm aware of all the loose ends I'm leaving with this, and the subsequent chapters will hopefully tie most of them up. As for the irony involved with writing a three-chapter epilogue to what was originally a one-shot story, I'm fully aware, so don't even bother pointing it out. (Smart-alecks!)

Having said that, it's once again time for everybody's favorite literary device, the _Legal Disclaimer!_

As usual, I don't own nuttin'! The original story belongs to the Captain, while the characters, of course, belong to the Disney Corporation. Any attempt to imply otherwise will be met with litigious action of a malicious nature, and any other big, scary-sounding legal words I can think of. Prosecutors will be violated… or something to that effect.

In summary: The characters belong to Disney, the story belongs to The Captain, the world belongs to Bill Gates, my kidneys belong to my bookie, and all your base belong to us!

And now, without any further ado, let's light this candel…

**Chapter One**

For any person who has ever sought the definition of "serenity," they need look no further than a mountain night.

Far, far away from the hustle and the crowds of city life, the land is enveloped in a silken blanket of utter calm. The din of traffic is banished in favor of the whisper of the wind through the pines, set to the accompaniment of a chorus of chirping crickets. The sky above comes alive, not with streetlights, but with the light of a hundred million stars, setting the heavens ablaze, bringing an awe-inspiring grandeur to the cosmic firmament.

Within this setting, even the greatest of men can be humbled. Throughout the millennia, kings and counselors have felt compelled to simply sit upon the ground when confronted by its immense beauty, taking time to ponder the larger questions of the universe, and to question the nature of their own existence.

This was also true for a solitary figure, standing atop remote ridge, high upon the slopes of Mount Middleton. Surrounded by the trees and enveloped by the darkness, he took in the view that his elevated vantage point avoided him. The starry night provided just enough illumination to create the glint of a reflection upon the waters of Lake Middleton far below. Beyond this, almost to the horizon, the lights of the city itself could be seen, indicating the line of demarcation where the serenity of the wilderness yielded to the unrelenting march of urbanization and development.

As was the case with countless souls before him, who had looked up at the night sky and felt compelled to assess their very existence, the figure began to wonder about the nature of his own being. The circumstances he was now being forced to address with these questions, however, were something that no one in this position had ever had to deal with before.

"What am I?" the young, blond-haired man asked himself. "Am I a ghost?"

It was a question that Ron Stoppable really didn't have an answer for. From his own point of view, he certainly seemed real enough. He could pick things up, open doors, clobber people, etc.

This last ability had come in handy. He had to smile when he thought of the reaction Drakken and Shego had displayed when he first confronted the evil duo in Drakken's mountain lair. The sight of what appeared to be a rotting corpse attacking them had struck such terror into the pair that subduing them and alerting the authorities had proved itself to be "beyond easy."

However, never having been a ghost before, he wasn't sure if this wasn't standard ghosting procedure. He thought long and hard about how to test this theory, playing different scenarios through his head, looking for something that would provide ample evidence of his "ghost-hood" without assuring that he would soon become one if the initial results proved negative.

"_Well…"_ he thought to himself. _"In every movie I've ever seen, ghosts can walk through walls. Maybe if I tried walking through something, then that would do it?"_

Stepping back from the ledge, he walked over to a large rock, which was jutting conspicuously out of the ground. He spread his arms wide and closed his eyes. Then, with a deep breath, he strode forward…

One step… 

_Two steps…_

…_**BONK!!!**_

He quickly staggered back, clutching his face where his nose had impacted the surface of the rock. The rock, as it turned out, had not yielded an inch. It was quite solid, and apparently, so was he.

"Yeeee-owch!" he hissed through clenched teeth. "Memo to self: Don't **EVER** do that again!"

He slowly walked over to another nearby rock, sitting down as he rubbed his bruised nose. The bruises to his pride would not be so easy to treat, but they too would eventually heal.

He certainly seemed real enough, so the ghost-theory was officially out the window. _"But what does that leave?"_ he asked himself. _"I still don't know what I am."_

Never having been the brightest pixel on the screen, it took him some time to organize his thoughts and take stock of his sitch. Was he a zombie of some sort? He had to admit that this was a possibility, but he had no way of explaining how it could have come to pass. Admittedly, he knew very little about the concept of zombification, as most of his experiences with these undead creatures had come in the form of smashing them in video games. He was pretty sure, however, that they were created by some sort of magic. The fact that there were very few Voodoo shamans running around Middleton seemed to immediately kill the zombie idea, no pun intended.

Ron quietly growled to himself, as he realized he was once again back at "Square A," with no real clue as to just what he was at the moment. To make matters worse, his nose was still throbbing from his "run-in" with the rock moments before.

Absent-mindedly, he rubbed his nose once again, looking at his fingers after removing his hand. Through the darkness of the star-lit night, he could see a faint smear of blood across the fingertips of his glove. It was bright red and slightly viscous, indicating that it was quite fresh and not quite ready to coagulate just yet.

"Great… I'm bleeding," he muttered to no one. "Things just keep getting better."

No sooner had he finished that sentence, than his eyes shot wide-open in the darkness, realization reaching down from the heavens to strike him like a thunderbolt.

"Holy chimmerito!" he shouted. "I'm _bleeding!_"

In a flash he had stripped off his glove, thrusting his right index and middle fingers into the familiar groove along the front of his neck. It didn't take more than an instant for him to detect the dull, rhythmic throbbing of his own pulse.

This was a major breakthrough! He had a _pulse!_ His breathing quickly became shallow and rapid with excitement, and this in turn led him to another realization:

He was breathing!

He nearly had to slap himself for not noticing this fact before, no matter how understandable the oversight may have been. After all, how often does a guy really think about something as trivial as breathing? It's normally such an auto-pilot sort of thing, that one fails to even notice it, at least until it stops.

The possibility presented by these facts was nothing short of astounding. For Ron, it left him absolutely thunderstruck, but there was no denying the conclusion that these revelations demanded:

He was alive!

He was also beyond rank, he realized, as he looked down at his own reflection in a nearby puddle. The mold spots on his cheeks were still there, and his hair was an even bigger mess than it had been that night in front of the store when he had first noticed his own appearance. He also reasoned, although he really couldn't tell for sure, that he was probably emitting a substantial aroma as well. Before he did anything else, he would need to get himself cleaned up.

Thinking quickly, he began to make a mental shopping list. It was quite a walk to get off the mountain, meaning it would be morning by the time he made it, and the small store would probably be open by then.

"Let's see… I'll need soap, shampoo, a washcloth and towel of some sort…" he said to himself as he walked. "A stick of deodorant probably wouldn't kill me either." He cupped his hand over his mouth and exhaled, nearly passing out from the foul-smelling blast that was reflected back to him.

"Toothbrush!" he gagged, as he desperately tried to regain his balance. "Definitely going to need a toothbrush!" Morning breath was bad enough, but death breath was in a league of its own. With a mouth like that, he figured he could probably knock a buzzard off a garbage truck at a range of ten paces.

Still, halitosis issues aside, there was no denying the fact that he was alive and well, or least as well as a guy who had been dead for a month could expect to be.

He found that he didn't have a clue as to how this strange occurrence may have come to pass, and for the moment, he didn't particularly care. All that mattered was that he was here; a living, breathing human being, just as alive as he had always been! He could eat and laugh, hang out at the mall and play video games… He could do all the things he had always enjoyed doing and had thought he would never get to do again. Heck, he could even hang out at Bueno Nacho with Kim!

That one name brought his whole train of thought to a screeching halt.

"Kim," he thought to himself. "What must these past few weeks have been like for you?"

Somehow, he knew he just couldn't imagine the hell his life-long friend must have gone through thinking he was dead. He tried imaging how he would react if their roles had been reversed, but the utter sense of terror and loss this thought conjured up was so powerful that he couldn't maintain the image in his mind, shutting it out just as quickly as he created it.

"_Water under the bridge…"_ he told himself, snapping his mind back to the task at hand. There was nothing he could do about things that were now locked within in the past.

There were, however, things he could do in the present.

Ron suddenly felt himself overcome with a new sense of urgency. He had to contact Kim: To let her know that he was, for want of a better word, okay. He needed to let her know that he was still there, still with her, just as he always had been, and always would be.

However, he really had no idea of how he was going to contact her. His phone call two weeks before had not gone over all-that well. Kim had been emotionally traumatized by what she had assumed was a prank call, and her father had read him the riot act because of it.

Ron had to admit that there was little reason to believe a second call would net results any different from the first. Letting his fingers do the walking simply wasn't something that was in the options box any more.

It would be a cold day in heck before he'd let that stop him, however. Somehow, he would find a way back to Kim. It didn't matter if he had to hitchhike, walk, flap his arms, or stick a stamp on his forehead and mail himself back to Middleton: He would find a way to do it.

"After all," he said to himself as he began walking again, his pace quickly gaining momentum.

"Where there's a will, there's a way."

-------------------------------------------

The stillness of the house was broken by the metallic click of a key being turned in a lock, and the bright red door slowly swung open revealing a young, hunched-over figure with hair of a similar hue.

Leaning heavily on her cane, Kim Possible slowly made her way toward the sofa in the family's living room. Even with the cane's assistance, walking was still a chore. She knew that she wasn't completely healed yet, and that her limp would get better over time, but the doctors' assurance that it would never go away completely was something that she found rather disconcerting.

She had learned to buoy her own spirits, however, by telling herself that this conclusion was based only on what the medical community knew at the time. Science and technology were making amazing progress on an almost weekly basis, and if the past decade was any indication, such advances would only accelerate in the near future. Just because the doctors couldn't fix the nerve damage today, didn't mean that they wouldn't be able to do so in a few years time. Her condition just had to wait for the technological curve to catch up.

For the moment, however, such thoughts were pushed to the back of her mind. As she settled down onto the sofa, her mind was a whirlwind of confusion and speculation. What was the meaning of the message scrawled on the wall of Drakken's lair? Did it mean Ron was still with them some how? If so, then in what way? Was he some sort of spirit now? A ghost, perhaps? If so, why hadn't he tried to contact her? Wasn't their bond strong enough that he'd want to? Was she finally loosing her mind?

Kim sunk back deeper into the cushions, throwing her head back and burying her face in her hands. None of it made any sense. Ron was dead, after all. After nearly a month-and-a-half of grieving, she was finally starting to make her peace with that fact. Deep down she knew her life would never be the same without him, but she would always carry a piece of him in her heart, and the fact that this memory of him would never die brought her at least some measure of comfort.

To spite the phone call, to spite the empty locker that now stood next to hers, to spite her having to pass by Bueno Nacho on a near daily basis, she had managed to come to terms with this incredible loss. Now, just when she seemed to be turning the corner, this sitch comes along to pull her right back down again.

"Arrrrrrgh!" she growled to herself. "Why is this so darn difficult? Why can't I move on?"

"Ron is _dead!_" she continued ranting, fresh tears beginning to stream down her face. "He died saving me! I watched it happen! I saw the rocks fall on him! I watched my best friend _die!_"

She slouched forward on the sofa, burrowing her face as deep into her own hands as she could. The horrific image of the cave-in played over and over again through her mind, as if it was some sort of mental film loop, which she was unable to turn off, or even look away from.

This was one fact that she would never be able to escape. Doctors may one day be able to fix her damaged body, but they would never be able to heal her spirit. All the medicine in the world could never erase the memory of what she had witnessed that terrible night. If only she hadn't turned around when she did. She would have never had to bear witness to her life-long best friend's death.

For several minutes, Kim simply sat there motionless, sobbing quietly into her hands, the film loop continuing to run through her head. She could recall every minute detail; each rock as it fell, the dust cloud that billowed up in the aftermath, the expression on his face as the torrent of rock and debris came down on top of him… She had seen everything.

Then, from the disturbing parade of images, came an unexpected thought: A small sense of realization, scratching its way through towards the light of day. Her crying ceased and she glanced up slowly as her mind began to process this unexpected visitor from the depths of her subconscious.

What had she actually seen, she asked herself. For weeks, she had telling herself that she had seen Ron die. However, when reviewing the details, she was forced to admit that this statement wasn't entirely true. She had seen him buried, that much was certain, but had she actually seen him _die?_

This question posed a certain difficulty. After all, how exactly was she to define "death" in this scenario. There was a difference, after all, between the act of dying, and actually being dead. The later of these was something that she had most definitely not seen.

Ron's body had never been recovered, as rescue crews had deemed the tunnel too unstable to enter. The mine had, for all practical purposes, become his tomb. There were even plans to erect a small monument near the mine's entrance at some point in the future.

This left only the question of whether she had witnessed the event itself. She had seen him buried, after all, but was that the same as him _dying?_ One certainly seemed to follow logically from the other, but then again, stranger things had happened. In the life they had both led, one learned to expect the unexpected.

Kim vaguely recalled hearing stories about soldiers being buried alive in underground bunkers during combat, only to dig their way to the surface and re-emerge, sometimes years after the battle had ended. Such stories were nothing less than unbelievable, but they were also well documented, and as such, undeniably true.

Slowly, the faintest hint of an idea began to form in the back of Kim's mind. Indistinguishable at first, it began to take shape as it moved ever closer to the forefront of her consciousness, developing form and substance as it went, finally bursting into the light of recognition with all the glorious brilliance of a lightning bolt.

"Maybe the cave-in didn't kill him!" Kim suddenly exclaimed, bolting up from the sofa. "Maybe he survived! He is known for his dumb luck, after all! _Maybe he's still out there!_"

In a flash, Kim was on her feet and hobbling as quickly as she could toward her attic bedroom, her cane abandoned beside the sofa. After a nearly six week hiatus, it was truly incredible how quickly she could snap back into "Mission Mode."

The proposition that Ron was still alive must have seemed beyond preposterous to anyone else. Even Kim had to admit to herself that she was sounding like a complete lunatic, jumping into action on such a far-fetched theory. However, improbability wasn't anything that was going to stop her. No matter how crazy the lead may seem, she would follow it up, as long as it presented even the dimmest of hopes of finding Ron. She would limp the whole way up Mount Middleton if she had to. She was the girl who could do anything, and she _would_ do anything; anything to find her way back into the arms of the life-long friend she had grown to love with all of her being.

She would find Ron, and they would be together again, always and forever…

_Of this she had no doubt._

-------------------------------------------

Pitch darkness slowly gave way to light, grudgingly yielding its inky-black grip on the underground labyrinth that was the Mount Middleton Mine. Moments later, a solitary figure came into view, holding aloft an electric lantern as it walked. The figure's pace was slow and uneven, showing obvious signs of injury, but nonetheless never ceasing in its forward progress.

It had been a rough trip to this point, and this assessment was from someone who was no stranger to rough trips. Sitting in the car during the drive up the mountain had been hard on her hip, and the long walk through the mine had only served to make matters worse. Factor in that the cold, damp air of the mine could render even healthy joints stiff, and you were left with a situation to test even the heartiest of souls.

For Kim Possible, however, dwelling on such discomforts was not an option. She was on a mission, after all: Perhaps the most important mission of her life. She was playing a hunch: A crazy hunch that, against all logic and reason, told her Ron was still alive. She couldn't explain how or why she felt this, but she felt it nonetheless. She felt it deep down in her bones, in her very soul; she could hear her spirit screaming that he wasn't dead.

Maybe it was the strength of the bond that had developed between them over the years. Having been best friends since preschool, their relationship had evolved and matured over the years, gradually gaining strength as they ultimately made the transition from friends to lovers. At times she suspected that somewhere during this process they had come to share a connection that went deeper than anything purely emotional. There was a sort of "soul link" between them, she felt; a link that transcended both emotional attachment and physical distance.

It was this link, she had to assume, that was driving her forward, searching for something that seemed an utter impossibility.

All such thoughts suddenly vanished as she rounded a corner in the tunnel, and instantly froze to the spot. There, straight ahead of her, looming in the shadows cast by the dim light of the lantern, was the place which now perpetually haunted her nightmares.

The scene was just how she remembered it. Each and every rock lay just where it had fallen on that terrible day. It was a snapshot, frozen in time, taunting her with its gruesome imagery.

Kim slowly scanned the chamber, not noticing that her breath had suddenly turned rapid and shallow. She could remember every detail of this place, the scene having been etched into her memory with the resolution of a professional photograph. There were the loose stones, the broken timbers, the sections of smashed conduit from the lighting system which still refused to function.

Then, something unusual caught her attention: Something innocuous enough on its own, but clearly out-of-place by the detailed image in her mind.

Off to the side of the chamber, nearly invisible in the dim light of the lantern, lay a few loose rocks, strewn haphazardly across the floor. In and of itself, this was nothing strange, but Kim swore to herself that they weren't there before. She cautiously began moving toward this area, which now commanded all of her attention.

It soon became clear, as she approached, that the area had been disturbed. The scattered stones were clearly from the pile which had collapsed down from the chamber roof. A small crevice had opened up when the stones had become dislodged, and a slight draft emanating from the opening told her that there was some sort of open space that lay beyond.

Kim's heart began pounding like a jackhammer inside of her chest as she approached even closer to the rock pile, and slipped the lantern through the narrow opening. She held her eyes closed as tight as she could and she swallowed hard, suddenly realizing that her mouth and throat were strangely bone dry. Was she ready to see what lay beyond this point? Had she adequately prepared herself for what she may be about to witness?

Up until this point she had been telling herself that Ron was somehow okay: That she could instinctively sense his presence, and that he was very much alive. It was a far-fetched hypothesis that up until now, she was willing to accept.

"_But what if I'm wrong,"_ Kim now asked herself. Even she had to admit the apparent craziness of her actions up to this point. What if this "sense" was nothing more than her grief-stricken mind playing tricks on her: A simple case of the power of imagination going horribly awry. If this was truly the case, then what was she about to do?

The answer was simple: She was about to look in upon the decaying, putrid remains of the most important person in her life, outside of her parents. She was about to disturb the grave of the sweetest, kindest, most devoted and pure-hearted person she had ever had the joy of knowing, and most likely, ever would know.

Kim was suddenly forced to ask herself a very brutal question: Was she so desperate to have him back that she was really willing to go _there?_

The possible consequences of what she was about to do chilled her to her very soul. The potential for this to turn into a life-altering, spirit-crushing event was very clear in her eyes, and she could comprehend the sheer gravity of the sitch.

However, more than anything else perhaps, she knew that if she didn't look, she would never be able to live with the prospect of not knowing. The need to know what had ultimately befallen her beloved Ron superceded all other considerations in her eyes.

Shoving the lantern even further into the empty space behind the rocks, she took a deep breath, held it for the longest of moments, then warily opened her eyes to the scene before her.

The space was small, perhaps no more than three feet deep by four feet high. It was little more than a pocket, really, created by the uneven pattern in which the larger stones had fallen. The floor of this pocket was strewn with smaller stones, much as the floor outside was cluttered with similar debris. However, it wasn't what she saw in this scene that had now taken Kim's very breath away, but rather it was what she didn't see…

…_There was no body._

"He's not here!" Kim mentally screamed to herself, her heartbeat once again accelerating to a nearly staccato cadence. "Ron's not here!"

Suddenly Kim found herself awash in a vortex of different images and possible scenarios. "This could all be some sort of sicko prank," she told herself. "Some old arch-nemesis could be playing me, first with the phone call, and now by removing the body."

But while this theory did make a certain degree of sense, she still couldn't ignore the tiny voice coming from deep inside her gut: A voice that was now screaming at her louder than it ever had before:

"He's out there… and he's alive!" 

"The phone call," Kim reasoned. "That's the key to this mystery, now. If I can get Wade to trace where it came from…" Even as the sentence was forming her mind, she was pulling the Kimmunicator from its trusty pouch on her utility belt.

Impatiently, she mashed her thumb down onto the call button, repeating the effort after a few seconds had elapsed without a response. When her second effort netted the same results, she muttered an oath to herself and began to slap her open palm against the small, aquamarine device. Twice in rapid succession, her palm impacted the plastic case of the offending implement. The third time, it impacted her forehead.

"Well, Duh-_huhhhhhh!_" she tersely scolded herself. "Does the term 'underground' mean anything to you, Possible?"

She knew that the Kimmunicator's com-link relied on an uplink interface with telecommunication satellites: Something that was rather difficult to achieve when you were standing underneath three million metric tons of rock. If she was going to contact Wade, then she would first need to return to the surface.

With that thought, Kim re-pocketed the Kimmunicator and began the long return trek, back toward daylight at a pace as fast as her condition would allow.

There was suddenly a fire burning in her emerald-green eyes that hadn't been there for several weeks. She was a tigress on the hunt, the scent of her prey growing stronger in her nose with each and every step. Her determination was stronger now than it ever had been previously, and it was growing stronger even still. She would find him, she once again told herself… She would find him and they would be together once again. With God as her witness, she would find him!

She had the will… and she would find the way! 


	2. Chapter 2

The lone shopkeeper didn't even bother looking up when the early-morning quiet was broken by the sound of a small brass bell, signaling the arrival of an unknown customer. It wasn't unusual for some self-styled outdoorsman to come wandering in from one of the nearby campsites at this hour, lamenting the fact that he had neglected to pack extra socks, or had brought the wrong brand of premium coffee for the trip. Such over-pampered, suburbanite, woodsman-wannabes were as thick as mosquitoes in these parts, it seemed, and their presence in the store didn't even warrant distracting one's attention from the latest issue of "Field & Stream."

The bearded clerk licked his weather-worn fingers and turned to the next page. He was so engrossed in the article entitled: _"How to Wrap a Grizzly For Mailing"_ that he was only peripherally aware of the young figure now perusing through the shelves near the back of the store. His attention was quickly diverted, however, when said figure dumped an armload of supplies onto the counter in front of him.

"Dang, boy!" came the first words from his mouth upon seeing his first customer of the day. "What in tarnation did y'all do, anyway? Step on a land mine or somethin'?"

Ron regarded the hayseed-looking character behind the counter, thinking that the gentleman really didn't look much better than he did. The man wore a plaid, flannel shirt with clearly threadbare sleeves, a beat-up wide-brimmed hat, and an unkempt, graying beard that would have made Grizzly Adams proud. All in all, he looked like he had just stepped out of "_Deliverance_."

He had to quickly think of an answer for the gentleman, however, and he doubted that telling the guy he had been dead for a month would net a favorable response.

"Uhhhh… Hiking trip." Ron blurted out. "Up in the back country. Things got kinda rough."

"I'll say!" the man shot back. "How far back did y'all go? Guatemala?"

"Let's just say we did." Ron replied, quickly tiring of the conversation. "Look, I'm kinda in a hurry here, so if you don't mind…"

The man simply grunted and started ringing up the items in front of him.

"Hmmmmm… Granola bars, bar o' soap, toothpaste, travel shampoo, looks like you've got the right idea there, youngin'."

"Yeah, thanks for the tip." Ron tersely replied, anxiously glancing about. He was now growing increasingly eager to leave, as he could swear he was hearing a banjo somewhere in the background.

"Annnnnnd… That'll be $18.26," the shopkeeper finally concluded.

Ron reached deep into the pocket of his well-soiled cargo pants and laid the money on the counter. Turning to go, he found himself in such a hurry to vacate the premises that he nearly left the bag with his purchases lying on the counter.

As he bounded out the door, he ventured a glance back, and noticed the shopkeeper observing him as well. One thought was prominent in minds of both men:

"_What sort of a weird-o was that?"_

-------------------------------------------

"Don't give me that look, Wade!"

"What look?" the young web-master inquired.

"The look that says you're about to call the happy hospital and reserve that special room." Kim responded sardonically.

"Well, you have to admit," Wade said defensively, "you're not exactly coming across as entirely rational right now."

"Arrrrrgh! I'm telling you, Wade… _He's alive!_" Kim growled, a rising level of frustration evident in her voice. "I know it sounds insane, but somehow I also know it's true!"

"Okay, okay…" Wade said in response, trying to calm the agitated teen heroine down. Kim's face had by now taken on a hue similar to her hair, and it had the young tech-guru concerned. "So what do you need me to do?" he finally concluded.

"Can you run a trace on all incoming calls to my house from about two weeks ago?" Kim asked.

"You're thinking about the prank call that night?"

"Yeah, I am… Except now I'm not so sure it was a prank."

"Well, if Ron did make it out somehow, it would make sense he would try to contact you."

"I know, Wade. That's why I want the trace. Can you do it or not?" Kim asked impatiently.

"I gotta be honest, Kim." Wade said as his chubby fingers began a frenzied dance across the keyboard. "This could be a tough one. Phone companies only maintain their call logs for so many days. After that, the files are purged."

Kim's shoulders slumped forward as she sighed dejectedly. She had been pinning all of her hopes on this trace, and now there was the possibility that it may be a dead end. (She quickly gave herself a mental slap for using that terminology in this sitch.)

"Any other options." She inquired, a faint twinge of hope still evident in her voice.

"Well… If I can hack into the router systems, I might be able to find some secondary files that weren't deleted as part of the regular system-maintenance program."

"And how long will that take?" Kim inquired, the hope in her voice suddenly growing in strength.

"Hard to say, Kim. It's a pretty complex system that they've got here. There's multiple levels of security, redundant files to wade through, incompatible protocols in some… _Got it!_"

"Spankin!" Kim enthusiastically replied. "Rockin' as usual, Wade!"

"I am what I is." Wad replied with a self-satisfied smile.

Kim winced slightly at this, remembering it as one of Ron's favorite catch phrases. Still, there was a need to press on with her investigation.

"So what have we got?" she inquired.

Wade placed a thoughtful hand in front of his mouth as he carefully scanned the list of records displayed on his screen, searching for the appropriate information.

"Well…" he finally said. "It looks like the call in question was placed from a pay phone outside of a general store not far from your current location.

"The store we passed on our way to the mine that night?" Kim asked excitedly, her "hope level" now growing even stronger.

"That's the one." Wade confirmed. "It's strange that someone would be out there at that hour making a call, but if I was Ron in this sitch, then that's probably how I'd try to reach you."

"Thanks Wade!" Kim said, fresh tears once again starting to form in her eyes. "I don't even know how to repay you."

"Let me think about it and I'll get back to you." Wade said with a sly grin before his image disappeared from the screen.

Moments later, Kim was back behind the wheel of the Sloth, kicking up a rooster tail of dust and gravel in her wake. For the first time, she felt she had a solid lead in the search, and her instincts now told her more strongly than ever that she was on the right track.

Ron was out there, somewhere she could feel it in her bones. Her soul was reaching out to him, and from somewhere in the cosmic continuum, his was reaching back.

"Don't worry, Ron." She said to herself. "I will find you… _I promise!_"

-------------------------------------------

An unruly mop of dirty, blonde hair bobbed up and down through the underbrush as it made its way up the hill. It's owner, having decided his appearance was just way too freaky to be seen right now, had opted to avoid the main road in favor of the less-frequently traveled hiking trails. It was still a pleasant walk, however, and the solitude had the added benefit of allowing him the freedom to think.

"Okay, so I know I'm alive," Ron thought to himself as he walked along, gnawing on one of the granola bars he had just purchased. "But that still doesn't explain _how_ I'm alive."

This question was most definitely a poser, he had to admit. Not being a doctor, his limited knowledge of the medical sciences left him ill-prepared to answer such a ponderance.

After much thought, and the discounting of several ideas, he surmised that the blow to his head must have sent him into some sort of metabolic stasis, giving his body the chance to heal. He had heard of some animals that possessed this ability, although until now he would have never suspected that humans were capable of this trick as well. Perhaps it was a function of the Mystical Monkey Power. For a magical power so closely associated with the way of the warrior to have some sort of healing ability made a certain degree of sense, after all.

This explanation was admittedly far-fetched, but it was also the best that he could come up with. The entire sitch itself was beyond belief, after all, so why should the explanation be any different.

There was another question, however, that plagued him as he took another bite from his makeshift breakfast. Why was he just now feeling hungry again?

If one bought the whole "stasis" theory, then it made some sense. A stasis, after all, was little more than a sort of induced hibernation, and bears certainly didn't feel the need to get up and raid the fridge for a mid-winter snack. However, that didn't account for the two weeks that had elapsed sine he had "awakened," or "resurrected," or whatever the heck it was that he had done.

Maybe his body's metabolism had just taken several days to re-adjust itself to "living-time," as it were? Once again, it seemed as good an explanation as any.

At any rate, there were still more pressing issues to be dealt with at the moment, and getting himself cleaned up was first on the list. Polishing-off the last of the granola, had headed up the trail, making a B-line for the public showers located behind one of the nearby campsites. He'd wash-up, get his bearings, then find means of getting back to Middleton… (Preferably in that order.) Somehow he could hardly wait to see the look on Kim's face when he walked through her front door, and back into her life.

"What a glorious moment that will be." he said to himself as he headed up the path.

-------------------------------------------

Twin emerald eyes took in the scene before them. In some ways, the store looked as though it had been pulled right out of the old west. Goods of various types were stacked haphazardly on shelves that looked to be more warped than a Michael Jackson day-care center. In some areas, the dust was so thick that one could probably ski on it, and the entire place smelled like a combination of mildew and muscatel.

The sight of such an un-sanitary environment, however, did little more than strengthen the red-headed heroine's resolve. This was the only lead she had, after all, and come Hell or high water, she was going to follow it up, filth and grime be damned!

Confidently, she strode up to the clerk behind the counter, trying desperately to push past the fact that he looked like a casting extra from an episode of "Hee-Haw."

"Excuse me," she said, "but I was wondering if you'd seen anyone loitering in this vicinity recently?"

The weather-beaten face looked up from its reading to regard the figure before it.

"Ya'll mind talkin' in English there, little darlin'?" the man replied.

Kim bristled at being called "little darlin'," but pressed on.

"Sorry… Has there been anybody hanging around here lately?"

"We get a few folks through here from time to time." The man answered. "Care to narrow it down there just a smidge."

"Well, he's about five-foot-seven with blonde hair and brown eyes."

"We talkin' 'bout a guy or a gal, here?"

"HE! _He's_ about five-foot-seven!" Kim quipped. Apparently this gentleman really was as dumb as he looked.

"Hmmmmmm…" the clerk thoughtfully hummed, considering his answer. "Naw, we haven't had anyone 'round here by that description."

With these words, Kim could feel her heart sink into the pit of her stomach. She had pinned all of her hopes on this lead, and it had proved to be nothing more than a dead end: A blind alley leading only to disappointment and despair. Desperately fighting back the urge to break down crying right then and there, she slowly turned and began to walk away.

"Well, there was that one feller' that came in off the trail this mornin'," the clerk suddenly added. "But his face wasn't really what grabbed my attention."

"Come again?" Kim asked; her back still turned to the rustic-looking gentleman. "What do you mean by that?"

"Well, I mean I've seen folks come down out of the back country lookin' pretty ripe plenty o' times," the man explained. "But this feller' looked like he'd been _dead_ for a month."

This statement grabbed Kim's attention like a vice and snapped her head around as if neck was a spring. She spun on her heels, nearly knocking over a display of canned goods in the process, and bolted back up to the counter.

"What did you say?" she demanded excitedly. "What do you mean he looked like he'd been dead?"

Being used to the normally laid-back atmosphere of the store, the clerk was momentarily taken aback by this sudden flurry of emotion. It took him several moments to compose himself enough to answer.

"I meant just what I said, darlin'." He finally replied. "With all the dirt and mold-spots on him, the feller' looked like he'd just crawled out of a hole or somethin'… Smelled like a pot of two-week-old jambalaya left out in the sun, too." He wrinkled his nose for effect.

With this statement, Kim's heart once again shifted its position, this time shooting upward into her throat. The description of this mysterious visitor lifted her spirit to an altitude that it had not known for weeks. It had to be him, after all. Who else in the world _could_ fit that description right now.

"Where he was headed?" Kim now demanded, fairly shouting the question at the still lackadaisical clerk.

"Dunno, hon." He replied. "Feller' wasn't too talkative fer the most part. Judging by the stuff he bought, tho', I'd be a bettin' he was a-lookin' to get himself cleaned-up a bit."

"And where would someone go to do that?" Kim prodded with growing frustration. By now, her patience with the bearded, backwoods ruffian was officially starting to wear thin.

"Pro'lly the camp showers just up the road 'yonder." Came the clerk's response, accompanied by a thumb thrust casually over his shoulder. "That's where I'd be headed to if I was him."

"_Of course!"_ Kim thought to herself. _"The showers! It makes TOTAL sense!"_ Being dead for over a month would have to leave a person in a pretty funky state. Ron must need a major freshening up by this point.

Without even venturing a glance back at the clerk, Kim whirled around and bounded for the door, shouting a hasty thank-you over her shoulder as she went: Her stride so quick and confident that one would have never suspected to look at her that she was suffering from a debilitating injury.

The Kim of old was most definitely back this morning, as her emerald eyes narrowed with the intensity of focus that had, over the years, all but become her trademark. Heading toward her car to the cadence of a brisk march, her mind was wholly focused on her next target: The Showers. She didn't know what she'd find there, but it was where the trail was leading her, and it was a trail she was going follow. She'd follow it to the end of the earth if she had to.

"_After all,"_ she thought… _"Ron would do the same for me."_

-------------------------------------------

Okay, so it wasn't the Ritz Carlton…

In fact, it wasn't even a Motel 6 for that matter. The water here wasn't heated, the pressure was weak, there was little, if any, privacy or protection from the elements, and to say that the overall facilities were basic was to risk the title of "Understatement of the Year."

Still, it felt pretty good to be clean again, or at least as clean as one could get with cold water and off-brand soap that didn't take well to lathering in such conditions.

That wasn't to say that there weren't bright points to the sitch, however. The brand of toothpaste he had found at the store that morning was certainly tasty enough.

"Mmmmm… Minty, not mediciney." Ron commented to himself, smacking his lips with pleasure. He made a mental note to check and see when he got home if Smarty Mart carried that particular label.

He also had to be thankful that the facilities here, as well as the adjoining campground, were deserted this particular morning. As bad as his appearance must have been an hour earlier, he was certain that his arrival would have turned more than a few heads, and that particular type of attention wasn't something that he really wanted right now.

He shivered involuntarily as he toweled off. Mornings were usually brisk in the mountains, and being forced to take a cold shower in a room with no roof wasn't helping matters any. Moving quickly to avoid catching another chill, he finished drying off, and returned to his clothes.

"Ugh, gorchy!" came his instinctive response upon placing the black mock-turtleneck to his face. It seemed strange to him that he was using a word Kim had invented back when they were six, but it really did seem to fit the sitch.

He hadn't noticed it before, probably because his own scent was just as bad, if not worse than that of the fabric. However, having just now scrubbed the funk off of his own person, the depth of his predicament became abundantly clear:

He needed to do some serious laundry.

He sighed heavily and grumbled to himself. This was somewhat of a sticky wicket, as there were no laundry facilities nearby. Slumping his shoulders dejectedly, he resigned himself to his fate: He would have to get creative and improvise his own solution.

Straightening up and grabbing his clothes, he began to look around, taking stock of what meager resources there were available to him. The showers were the most obvious solution, but the lack of pressure meant the task would take forever, and he really didn't want to have some stranger popping in to the sight of him kneeling in his underwear, scrubbing stains out of a shirt that now looked like some sort of second-hand rag bin reject.

His mind now raced to the lake, as he thought about history lessons from school. Early settlers occasionally did their laundry on rocks along side stream banks, he recalled. Maybe he could do the same thing?

Admittedly, he had no idea of how the entire process was supposed to work. He would simply have to trust his dumb skills and assume that he would quickly figure it out through simple trial and error. The lake did offer the advantage of solitude, however, so he would have that going for him.

At any rate, there was no reason to stick around here any longer, he reasoned as he gathered up the rest of his things and headed down the hill toward the lake. He had things to do, and he wasn't getting any younger. _"After all,"_ he thought to himself…

"_Life waits for no man."_

-------------------------------------------

A bright-magenta vehicle skidded to a stop in the dirt near the entrance to the campground, quickly discharging itself of its lone occupant. If anyone had been about the immediate area at that moment, they would have instantly recognized the figure standing before them.

There stood Kim Possible, the great teen hero, as commanding and resplendently confident as ever. Standing tall and firm, her auburn mane wafting ever-so-slightly in the light mountain breeze, she was the very embodiment of the image which the world had come to know her by.

Emerald-green eyes narrowed, taking in the scene before them. The area appeared to be deserted, except for herself and the occasional squirrel. Still undaunted, Kim pressed ahead, striding up the gentle slope toward the rear of the campground where the showers were located. Her focus on this objective was so intense, that she failed to notice her limp had all but vanished.

As the shower complex came into view, however, a new wave of emotion fell over her. The focus and determination that had been present only moments before, was suddenly and unexpectedly replaced by feelings that caught her completely off-guard.

Doubt and emptiness: These were things that Kim was not used to feeling. After all, she was always the one in control of the sitch. Perpetually in the driver's seat, she could always be confident in her actions and reactions, and in this confidence she found comfort.

This, however, was uncharted territory. This wasn't the sort of situation one could control, after all. All through this day, she had simply been reacting to circumstances, playing hunches, and allowing events to lead her, rather than the other way around.

There was also the indisputable fact that she still had no real proof to support her suspicions. She was still, for the most part, chasing shadows, and there was just no way to tell how close she was to finding Ron.

Taken together, this raised the undeniable possibility that there was simply nothing to be found: That her entire quest had been little more than an exercise in wishful thinking and self-delusion. This thought brought into play yet another feeling with which she was both unfamiliar and uncomfortable:

_Fear._

For a natural-born leader such as herself, this was perhaps the most difficult emotion of all. There were all-types of fear wrapped up in this sitch, after all. There was the fear of being wrong, the fear of disappointment, the fear that she was going crazy, and the greatest fear of all, the fear that her life-long friend was, indeed, gone.

This was the moment of truth, for just a few yards away now, stood the ramshackle-looking, corrugated tin structure of the showers. All of her longing, all of her hopes, all of her dreams for the future which she had been pinning on this quest, were now only moments away from either being gloriously confirmed, or horrifically smashed into oblivion. This was her moment of reckoning, when her life would either be given back to her, or be cast off into the darkness of eternal despair, and it was just through that door.

Kim felt faint, and the world around her suddenly began to swirl about. Her heart was hammering away inside of her chest like a locomotive, and her throat seized-up, making breathing difficult. She felt she was literally being suffocated by the apprehension of the moment. Part of her had to know what lay beyond that door, and yet part of her couldn't bear to know. She thought for a moment if she could only wish it hard enough, then she could somehow freeze time in its place, trapping herself in a perpetual state of hope, always believing the best, and never having to risk that belief being dashed away before her very eyes.

Alas, her wish went unanswered, and she was left with only one course of action: She had to look inside that room.

She swallowed hard, and through pure strength of will, she pushed herself forward until her gloved hands grasped the sides of the doorframe. She swallowed once again, took several deep breaths, and summoning every last ounce of courage she could muster, peered inside. Her jaw dropped when confronted with the sight before her:

_Nothing._

The shower was just as empty as the rest of the campground: a picture of pure desolation. The barren, empty space stared back at her mockingly, tearing deep gashes into her very soul.

For Kim, it was simply the last straw. The emotional dam, which had been tentatively holding up until this moment, finally gave way, releasing a torrent of pent-up anxiety and grief. She was barely aware of the rough, stone floor rushing up to meet her knees, the dampness quickly soaking through the fabric of her olive-green cargos. Tears fell in torrents as she vented every conceivable emotion, mourning the loss of two lives, one of them her own.

"_It's a dead-end!"_ she cried to herself, not even noticing the double meaning of that particular phrase at this moment. _"This was all for nothing!"_

The stillness of the mountain morning was now shattered as a rising chorus of mournful wails filled the forest, ringing through the trees. Kim sobbed uncontrollably into her own hands, desperately wishing that something or someone would come to relieve her of this terrible fate which had now befallen her. Living without Ron, she now realized, simply wasn't living at all: It was merely existing, and that was a fate worse than death itself.

As the tears continued to stream down her face, Kim's mind slowly retreated back into the recesses of its own consciousness. Freefalling through a deluge of memories, she fell into a world where Ron was still with her: In elementary school, at the Middleton Fair, at their Junior Prom on that magical night when they first realized their true feelings for each other. It was a world which she had assumed would last forever, but was now lost to her for all time.

For the longest time, Kim Possible stayed there, huddled on the cold-stone floor, wracked by sobs and shivering in the chill of the brisk morning air. In the span of less than five minutes, she had transformed from the confident hero of old, into a quivering shadow of her former self, her world quickly becoming a much larger, much darker place in which to live.

-------------------------------------------

Trial and error can be a rough road sometimes, especially when that road seems to lean heavily toward the "error" side of things.

"_Man… I've never been so glad I live in the twenty-first century."_ Ron thought to himself as he gingerly massaged his throbbing fingers. It had been a difficult process figuring out just how a "pioneer Laundromat" was supposed to function, and his hands had paid the price for his inexperience.

"_Ugh… This most def has 'bruise' written all over it. From now on, I am going to stay AWAY from heavy, blunt objects!"_ he silently lamented. _"…And sharp, pointy ones too, for that matter."_

At least he had accomplished his task. His clothes were now relatively clean, and although they were still slightly damp from the ordeal, it wasn't bad enough to be really uncomfortable. Besides, the temperature was finally starting to warm up that morning, so they would dry on their own before too long.

The plan now was to make his way back to the store and use the pay phone to call a cab. It was simple enough in its conception, but as plans went, it wasn't without its flaws. This was primarily due to the fact he wasn't sure if the cash he had on hand was enough to cover the fare. Maybe he could find a driver who accepted ATM cards? He had to hope so, as he really didn't have a "Plan B" at this point.

He started back down toward the hill, skirting the edge of the campground, using the forest for concealment. Although his appearance had improved considerably in the past few hours, he still didn't feel much like being observed. The driveway from the main road was just coming into view when the brisk pace of his walk suddenly stopped with a jolt.

Something had caught his eye. Turning his head slowly to look over his shoulder, he noticed a patch of color peering back at him through the trees. It was a flamboyant, obnoxious, eye-popping color: A color that clearly had no place being in a natural environment such as this. Squinting through the shadows of the forest, Ron stared intently at the strange hue before him. His heart skipped a beat when her finally recognized its identity:

_Magenta._

The pay phone and taxi all but forgotten, his brisk walk suddenly morphed into a mad dash, dodging tree branches and underbrush as he went. There was only one thing in the world that he knew to be painted in such a gaudy color, and the image that it presented was almost enough to send him into a hyperventilation-induced coma. As he finally broke through the tree line and skidded to a stop, the sudden blast of pinkish-hue nearly seared his retinas. After more than a month in the wilderness, it certainly was a jolting sight, but to him, at this moment, there couldn't have been a more beautiful sight in the world.

Yes, the modified SL Roth was unmistakable. Fingerprints of the Tweebs' handiwork were all over the thing, after all. Ron could feel his heart accelerate inside his chest and his breathing become shallow. His eyes darted wildly left and right, searching for anything else familiar. He knew that the presence of this vehicle could only mean one thing in the world:

_Kim was nearby._

For all he could tell, he was still very much alone at the moment, but that didn't concern him all that much. He knew she was somewhere in the vicinity, undoubtedly searching for him, and it was only a matter of time until her search met with success. She was Kim Possible, after all… She could do anything.

Ron quickly sized-up the sitch: years of fieldwork experience suddenly taking over. He briefly considered initiating his own search for Kim, but quickly decided against it. He surmised that his best course of action was to simply stay put. Kim would have to return to the car eventually, after all, and when she did, she was going to receive that happiest surprise of her young life.

Ron soon found himself lost in thought. Leaning lazily against the side of pink coupe, he let his imagination to drift, conjuring up images of how their reunion would be. Her falling into his arms, wrapping each other in a warm embrace, both of them shedding tears of joy: the image had all the sappiness of an over-produced romantic movie, and in his opinion, it couldn't be more perfect.

Drifting through this surreal dream world, his attention was suddenly snapped back to reality by a distant sound. Far from the tearful joy and whispered greetings of his vision, the sound was a disdainful cry of agony: A sound born of ultimate suffering and total despair: A sound with a tone that he definitely recognized.

It had been two weeks since he had last heard her voice, and under such circumstances he would normally be overjoyed by the experience. The traumatic pain contained in those mournful wails, however, stabbed deep into his heart like an ice pick, and cut through his soul like a hot knife through warm butter.

He turned toward the direction of the sound, seemingly frozen in place by the tremendous wave of emotion now washing over him. He could feel her pain: all of her anguish, all of her frustration, all of her longing: all of it was his to experience. It all came crashing over him as a tidal wave of raw emotion, overwhelming him with its sheer intensity.

He stumbled slightly backward before regaining his footing, never taking his eyes away from the rear of the campground where the sound was originating. Then, almost by instinct, he was off, dashing up the hill in an all-out sprint. Kim was up there, somewhere, and she was suffering.

…And that was something he simply would not allow.

-------------------------------------------

_So, this is how the world ends._

Or at least, this was how _her_ world ended.

For Kim Possible, this was the end of her rope. For over twelve straight hours now she had been chasing a trail of evidence, banking every last hope and dream she had on the outcome of that chase.

And this was where the chase had brought her: To a cold, damp, empty room in the middle of nowhere. She was tired, she was drained, and she was alone.

_God, she had never been so alone._

Her air-shattering cries had by now subsided into a soft whimpering, but she still found herself unable to move from the spot on the floor she now occupied. She felt no need to move, no need to speak, no need to do anything. Her world was gone forever, and any action she could take was utterly pointless because of it.

She seemed content to remain planted in this spot forever, wallowing in her own misery. The sentiment left her so absorbed in her thoughts that she failed to notice the solitary figure, silently approaching from behind. Her crying stopped abruptly when she felt the light touch of an anonymous hand upon her shoulder.

Ordinarily, such unexpected contact would have resulted in Kim nearly jumping out of her skin, followed by severe bodily injury to the perpetrator. In this case, however, there was something different going on about the sitch. The touch was gentle and comforting, bringing a sudden sense of peace to her anguished spirit. It also seemed oddly familiar.

Slowly, Kim extricated her face from her hands, gradually turning her head to look over the shoulder in question. Emerald green eyes, now red and swollen from weeping, suddenly locked with ones of chocolate brown: A perfect pair of brown eyes, framed by oversized ears and perched two inches above the goofiest grin imaginable.

Kim sat frozen in mute shock, unsure of what she was seeing. Was this some sort of apparition? Had her insanity finally driven her to the point of hallucinations? Or had she simply fallen asleep, and was now experiencing the most wonderful dream imaginable? She fell backward slightly, reeling with confusion, and causing Ron to kneel concernedly in front of her.

"You okay there, KP?" he whispered, gently reaching out for her once again. He placed his hand under her chin and slowly brought her gaze up to meet his. Kim felt the feather-light caress; the supple touch of skin on skin, and a sudden tremble coursed through her.

This was all the proof she needed: He was real!

In an instant her arms were around his shoulders, exerting a vice-like grip that threatened to crack his sternum. Tears once again started to flow freely as he responded in kind, putting his arms around her and pulling her quivering form tight against himself.

Kim found herself once again wracked by sobs, but now tears of despair had been replaced by tears of joy. After six long weeks, her nightmarish ordeal was finally over. The divine powers of the universe, whatever they might be, had seen fit to return to her her life, her world, her reason for being. After what had felt like an eternity, Ron was back in her life, in her arms, and all was well with the world once again.

For Ron, it was quickly becoming clear that he had no idea what to do in this sitch. He was, after all, far more familiar with the cool, confident, strong-willed teen heroine that was Kim's normal persona. The crying, trembling, frightened little girl now before him was something wholly unexpected, and it left him at a complete loss.

Acting on pure instinct, he simply continued to hold her, softly whispering into her ear.

"It's okay… I'm here… I'm here." He repeated again and again.

"Hold me!" Kim sobbed, burying her face deep into the notch between his shoulder and neck.

"I am holding you." He softly replied.

"Hold me tighter!"

Ron dutifully complied, strengthening his grip around her back and drawing her even tighter into his chest. A slight twinge in his back told him that Kim had done the same.

"It's all right… I gotcha." He said, trying desperately to comfort her.

"Don't ever let go." She commanded.

"I won't."

"Promise?"

"I promise."

With this assurance, Kim's crying finally began to subside. Soon the emptiness of the showers was once again overtaken by the silent tranquility of the forest: a condition matched by the two reunited souls in it presence.

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**Author's Notes:**

Jeez, that took long enough to write, eh?

My strongest apologies for having taken so long to get this chapter out. With all the other irons in my fire right now, it was somewhat difficult to avoid, and the way this chapter just seemed to keep growing on me didn't help matters any.

I hope I managed to answer most of the hanging questions left by chapter one, (or chapter two if you're counting from The Captain's original story), but I'm sure there's still a few loose ends I missed, so feel free to point them out in your reviews.

As for the conspicuous absence of Rufus in this story, writing the little guy in was something I tried, but just couldn't seem to make work. One of my primary goals with this work was to stay true to Cap's original story concept. Rufus doesn't make an appearance in this initial installment, and bringing him in mid-stream always came across as awkward, breaking-up the flow of the story.

Anyhoooooo… There will be one more installment after this one: An epilogue of sorts, hopefully a lot shorter that the current chapter. Stay tuned and stay in school!


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three**

Eyes grew wide as the students of Middleton High were treated to a sight, which they thought would never be seen again. Two figures strode casually through the halls, locked in idle conversation, scarcely noticing the parade of bewildered expressions passing before them.

"C'mon, KP… Is that not the coolest idea in the history of _ever,_ or what?"

"Well… It does sound like it could be interesting."

"Interesting? Are you kidding, KP? A joint episode of MacGyver and The A-Team would hurricane_ rock!_" Ron responded, not even attempting to contain his enthusiasm for this idea.

"I mean, think about it, Kimbo. On one hand, you've got MacGyver: A man who can shut down a nuclear reactor with nothing but a Swiss army knife and a roll of duct tape! On the other, you've got the A-Team: A group of guys who you could lock in an empty room, and two hours later they'll have assembled an Abrams tank! If you put them together, just think of what they'd build at the episode's end!"

"Dunno… I'm guessing maybe an H-bomb of some sort?"

"YES!!! An H-bomb! Totally! Using two gallons of bleach, a jar of play-doh, the carburetor from a '68 dodge, and a macramé wall-hanging that they'd find wadded-up in the corner! Complete badicalness-ness-ness!"

"Uhhhhh… I don't think you can build a thermonuclear weapon from those items, Ron."

"So? That doesn't matter. This is the magical world of TV we're talking about here. Face it, KP… This idea would totally _kill_ in the ratings!"

"Spoken like someone who would know."

"Ugh… Don't remind me. I think I've still got fungus growing in my ears."

"Well, at least there's plenty of room."

"Watch it…" 

As they continued to walk, Kim couldn't help but smile. After all, simple little pleasures like this were something that, she had assumed, had been lost to her forever. Now, in the aftermath of their ordeal, she found a whole new appreciation for all the little details that she had previously taken for granted: Their casual conversations, his sheepish laugh, the way his ears seemed just a little too big for his head, that exceedingly goofy grin that he seemed to be constantly wearing. All of the little things that went into making him Ron suddenly took on new significance. She realized now that life was precious, and had the potential to be all-too short. There was a pressing need to savor the wonderfully small details that life presented, and Kim resolved to never again take such things for granted.

The comfortable pace of their walk abruptly stopped as the duo turned a corner in the hall. There, surrounded by members of the cheer squad, was Bonnie Rockwaller. Smug and snippy as ever, the leggy brunette was clearly well into her "rant mode," lecturing the other cheerleaders on one of her favorite topics.

"I mean, I realize that Stoppable is dead and everything," Bonnie groused, "but naming the stadium after him? I mean, c'mon! He didn't even play a whole season, and the only reason he was any good was because he was too chicken to do anything but run away from people. They might as well call the place 'Terrified Loser Memorial Stadium.'"

"I take it she hasn't heard?" Ron asked flatly.

"No, but she's about to!" Kim replied with a growl, her hands balling up into fists by her sides. She started to stride forward when a restraining hand clamped firmly onto her shoulder.

"Mind if I do the honors?" Ron asked with a mischievous grin.

"By all means." Kim replied, gesturing forward.

By this point, Bonnie was really rolling, listing off all the reasons that Ron was nobody that nobody should be making a fuss over. She was so engrossed in her tirade that she failed to notice the eyes of her fellow squad mates grow wide as dinner plates. Her concentration was finally broken, however, by the sensation of a light tap on her shoulder.

Incensed by this unexpected intrusion, she spun around in anger, only to find herself nose-to-nose with a face she thought she would never in a million years have to see again.

For the longest of moments, stunned silence permeated the hall, blue eyes locking with brown. Then, the faintest hint of a goofy grin could be observed.

"Boo." Ron said flatly.

Throughout the halls of Middleton High, heads jerked around as the high-pitched shriek of Bonnie's scream filled the school. Silence soon returned, however, as the blue-eyed brunette slumped to the floor, consciousness having been banished from her mind by the shock of the encounter.

Leaving the cheer squad members to tend to their own, Ron returned to Kim's side with a very satisfied smile playing itself out across his face.

"Ya' know, KP…" he said as the pair resumed their walk. "I could really get used to this whole 'undead' thing."

"Don't get too used to it." Kim quipped in response. "Everyone else will be getting used to you soon enough."

"Yeah, you're right as usual, KP." Ron conceded. "It's just that, sometimes I can't believe how much everything's changed in just six weeks."

"You're talking about them re-naming the stadium, aren't you?"

"Yeah, that's a biggie all right, but there's other stuff too."

"What kind of stuff?"

"Well, it's mostly the little stuff. Things like how quickly they cleaned out my locker, and found another running back for the team. Heck, I'm lucky my grades for this semester are even still on the books!"

At this, Ron suddenly pulled-up short, causing Kim to do a classic "double-take." His eyes grew wide.

"Sweet mother of all things cheesy!" he exclaimed. "What assignments must I have missed?!"

"Amp down, Ron." Kim said reassuringly. "It's no big."

"_No big?!"_ Ron exclaimed. "How can you say that, KP? With everything that must've happened while I was gone, I'll be lucky to even fail! And after all I put into this semester… _Arrrrgh!_"

"Easy there, zombie boy." Kim replied, a twinge of concerned exasperation now growing in her own voice. "I'm sure your teachers will be understanding and let you make the work up somehow. After all, there were extenuating circumstances at work here."

"I know… I know…" Ron continued, unabated. It's just that with the workload I've already set for myself this year, I don't know how I'll…"

"RON!" Kim interrupted, her patience by now growing desperately thin. "What were we discussing?"

"TV-crossover pairings from the eighties?"

"Before your extended absence, I mean."

"Oh, yeah, right… Let's see, now… Hmmmmmmm… That would be how many weeks ago now…"

"We were talking about your trying to take it easy with school." Kim sighed.

"Oh yeah, now I remember. So what about that, now?"

"Ron," Kim sighed again, placing her face in her hands.

"Yeah, KP."

"Chill!" 

Ron's only response was to smile sheepishly. As usual, Kim was right on the money.

"Besides," Kim added, pulling up close to Ron and placing her arm around his shoulders, allowing him to place his around her waist. "You'll find a way to work through this: _We'll_ find a way to work through this."

She turned to embrace him, meeting his smile with her own.

"As a very wise person once told me," she said as their lips met. "Where there's a will… There's a way."

-------------------------------------------

**Author's Notes:**

Well, that's pretty much all she wrote for this one. Hope you all enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.

Special thanks and mad props to The Captain for providing the inspiration and basis for this story. I never would have even thought of writing this without reading "Where There's a Will."

As for my next project, I'm working on a pair of one-shots that I hope to have completed and posted by summer. After that, I've got another multi-chapter work in the planning stages. This one should be on the same scale as _Shadows of Angels,_ so it will probably take a while to complete. (Get comfy, folks!)

In any case, take care of yourselves, stay out of drafts, and I'll be seeing you around the board!

Ciao!

Nutzkie… 

"A bookstore is one of the only pieces of evidence we have that people are still thinking."

-Jerry Seinfeld


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